Germ Theory

Can you catch a heart attack? Is cancer contagious? The conventional answer is no; these diseases are caused by bad genes and bad diet. But a revolutionary band of scientists thinks these sicknesses are actually caused by infections bugs. If they're right, it will be a medical revolution, many other ailments, from diabetes to Alzheimer's and even schizophrenia might be treated by something as simple as antibiotics. So Graham Phillips asks why is the medical establishment dragging its feet on this issue?

Many millions might be suffering - and dying - from heart disease, cancer and other illness, as a result of the medical establishment conservatism. A pioneer in the field was Australian scientist Barry Marshall, who showed that stomach ulcers were not the result of bad diet, but caused by the bacterium Helicobacter pylori. The medical establishment took years to accept Barry Marshall's ideas on ulcers - and many people suffered needlessly in the meantime. Finally his ideas are being accepted and antibiotics have become the standard treatment. Now the establishment is warming to the idea of heart disease being bug related, and trials are underway to see if antibiotics can help.

Broadcast:
Thu 7 Mar 2002, 9:30pm

Published:
Thu 7 Mar 2002, 9:30pm

Transcript

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Narration: Heart disease will kill almost half of us. For the rest it's likely to be cancer. We're told the reason is bad diet and bad genetic luck. But some scientists think there's another cause. infectious bugs. They say we catch heart attacks and cancer.

Professor Paul Ewald from Amherst college in Massachusetts is leading the revolutionaries. He's not a doctor; he's an evolutionary biologist.he spends his days in the natural world rather than the surgery. And that's given him unique insight, he says. The laws of evolution virtually demand that many of today's common diseases must be caused by bugs.

Professor Paul Ewald: We recognise about 20% of all human cancers are caused by infection. The other 60% who knows, but for many of them there's evidence that infectious agents are also involved.

Narration: And it's not just cancer and heart disease. Many of the ailments that bring people here might involve viruses and bacteria, say the researchers. Alzheimer's disease, arthritis diabetes - even low sperm count.

Narration: Take schizophrenia. If it really is hereditary - then according to Ewald it shouldn't exist, or at least be very rare. Schizophrenics have fewer children than most and according to the laws of survival of the fittest, bad breeders don't survive. So can schizophrenia be caused by a bug?

Professor Paul Ewald: When we actually look at the data we find that if anything the evidence favouring infection as a primary cause of these diseases is better than the evidence favouring bad genes as the primary cause of disease.

Narration: The first hard evidence that bugs can cause these chronic diseases came from an Australian doctor Barry Marshall. The medical establishment virtually labelled him a loony but he conclusively proved that stomach ulcers were caused by a bug - helicobacter.

Professor Barry Marshall: In 1984 I drank a culture of the bacteria and then had an endoscopy a week later which showed that the helicobacter had infected my stomach and caused all this irritation which was the phase one if you like of developing an ulcer.

Narration: These days ulcer suffers keep eating then good food and wine; they don't even need to stop leading their stressful lives. A course of antibiotics and their stomach ulcers are gone.

Narration: It took years to convince the medical community that bugs caused ulcers, and the question many are now asking is: will heart problems be the next to be associated with a bacterium? The suspect bug, chlamydia pneumonia, is often picked up in childhood. It causes a cough and other respiratory problems. But it also gets in the blood and it might slowly damage the arteries. Science has suspected it for a long time.

Professor Paul Ewald: People recognised in 1940's that this was associated cardiovascular disease and yet that information just seemed to be lost for decades. So now we're in a sense, rediscovering some of that information that we should have paid attention to decades ago and if we had I think maybe we would've solved some of these problems by now.

Narration: At the Royal Brisbane Hospital scientists are trying to re-establish the link between chlamydia and heart disease. These surgeons are removing the plaque that builds up and blocks our arteries.the stuff that causes heart disease. The plaque sample is then taken to the Queensland University of Technology where it is examined for the presence of chlamydia bacteria. And the work here has shown that most heart disease sufferers do indeed have the bug.

Professor Peter Timms: It's only in diseased tissues and it appears to be in areas where perhaps the disease is worse. So I think the evidence is mounting now that it's not just an innocent bystander.

Narration: But again the medical establishment is being conservative.

Professor David Celemajer: As heart professionals we have to concentrate on what we know. Distractions like the infections story are really interesting scientific hypothesis, but they shouldn't distract us from the main game, which is use the preventative strategies that we absolutely know work and help Australians that way.

Narration: The heart professionals say the evidence is not strong enough yet for them to change their practices, but they are at least investigating the matter. The Monash Medical Centre in Melbourne is taking part in a worldwide trial to see if Chlamydia-killing antibiotics can help heart disease sufferers. The theory is, the Chlamydia infection weakens the arteries making them susceptible to cholesterol and a build up of plaque that otherwise wouldn't happen. This study won't be finished for a couple of years. And even if all goes well, it'll be many more years before you and I are taking antibiotics for heart disease, judging by Barry Marshall's experience. That's the way medicine works.

Professor David Celemajer: For every Barry Marshall there are a thousand people with seemingly outrageous ideas are wrong. I don't know whether this one is right or wrong. I'm just telling you at the moment don't use antibiotics because there ain't the proof.

Narration: For heart disease, even Ewald admits genes still play a role. But bugs are at least as important. And for many other diseases he suspects, bacteria and viruses could well play the primary role.

Professor Paul Ewald: There is a lot at stake here, because if people drag their feet when it comes to investigating the possibilities that infections are causing these diseases, and if they dismiss them without really having evidence that warrants dismissing them, then many people may die.